One of the most powerful weapons that the
Church has ever been given for the evangelization
of the world, you probably think that I'm
referring to the Bible, but I don't refer
to that as a weapon, though of course
it is, the word of God is sharper
than a two-edged sword, but I'm referring
to this cassette recorder.
You can now buy cassette recorders for about
$15.
There was a man back in Paris whose
heart was filled with hatred toward Christianity, and
through the cassette he completely took over the
nation of Iran, the first major cassette revolution.
We as God's people, we believe we have
the truth, we know the Bible is God's
word, and yet we are so unbelievably slow
in spreading it.
So here we are in the subcontinent, a
billion people, a thousand million people, and many
of them have never heard a single message
of the gospel.
Now in the last 25 years, OM and
Every Home Campaign, a number of groups have
been spreading literature, so quite a few have
read the gospel, but many are illiterate, and
they can't read it, though we know that
sometimes people read it to them, and we
are as committed to literature distribution as we
have ever been.
It's staggering the amount of literature the brothers
and sisters in India distribute.
I mean it is just amazing.
Truckloads and truckloads of literature go out, and
yet of course there are 700 million in
India alone.
I had this burden to somehow see OM
move into higher gear in the use of
the cassette tape.
You can now buy a blank cassette wholesale
for about 75 cents, 50 cents, 40 cents,
depends where you buy them.
The ship has proven the enormous power of
the cassette, as tens of thousands of people
have signed up to receive these cassettes.
The moment they hear the message on the
ship, they ask to raise their hand, how
many want the cassette?
I remember preaching to a group of pastors
in Spanish in Mexico when I was done,
how many wanted the message?
I think a hundred.
A hundred messages go out.
If everybody played that to their church, a
hundred times a hundred, how many people hear
the message?
I haven't been back in Mexico much since.
I'm ministering all over the nation.
Even as I'm sitting here now making another
cassette, realizing especially OM, a number of the
people I like to share with are out
busy right now, cassette enables them to listen
to it later on.
I was just sharing with one of the
brothers, we were having a little walk, and
he said, oh, he doesn't listen to cassettes
much, but he listened to one the other
day and it really ministered to his heart.
Seven major turn-offs.
Seven things people do that so quickly turn
off other people.
And he was challenged by that.
If you're into sevens, I've got a lot
of new seven messages, seven major blunders I've
just done down in Butwal, especially the seven
major blunders of returning OMers.
And then, of course, I think here in
Nepal, the possibilities for doing more with cassettes
is on the increase.
I know Gospel Recordings are doing something with
records.
The record, of course, is rapidly being replaced
by the cassette.
They are also doing something with cassettes.
You know, even those little Nepali tapes we
made at the church last time I was
ministering here, you duplicated sets of those.
We can't even measure what those messages are
going to do.
That's two of the pastors in Butwal both
have sets.
Other people bought copies.
And, you know, I think we need to
realize that many of the believers in Nepal
are not being grounded in basic understanding of
scriptures.
Of course, often extremist groups and all kinds
of interesting people are around with their various
messages.
And unless we give people a balanced diet
and a solid spiritual diet, they sometimes get
it from other places.
Now, that isn't the main thing on my
heart this evening, but I mention that in
a way of introduction because I think cassettes
are also a tremendous way for OMers to
get Bible teaching.
All these OMers, probably a very high percentage,
after one or two years in OM, they
all feel they must go to Bible school.
And there's nothing wrong with that except Bible
school is very short.
And if you think the knowledge of the
Bible, you get in Bible school, it equips
you for ministry, life ministry.
You must be a little naive.
If you're going to be equipped, you need
to be in the word of God all
the time.
You need to realize also that in a
lot of the Bible schools, there's a lot
of academic unreality.
People are just talking about things that are
not an experience in their own life.
In fact, quite a few people in Bible
schools are quite discouraged, but that's their profession.
They are now a teacher in a Bible
school.
That's their profession.
That's their career.
They're paid for that.
So they keep doing it even though they're
discouraged.
We have, of course, people in OM sometimes
that happens as well.
And I just believe that if you're serious
about Bible study, you want to get and
make better use of ministry that is available
on cassette tape.
Just in the last couple of weeks, I've
been able to go through a series of
tapes by Charles Swindoll, a series of tapes
by David Maines, a tremendous series on revival,
and in the middle of Peter Maiden's series
that he gave here at the conference when
I didn't have time to get in on
the sessions.
This is how I extended.
I only went to Bible college for two
years.
How I extended my Bible college for 25
years, always listening to systematic teaching on cassette,
new ministry on cassette, and it really has
been an enormous help in my own life.
And one of the reasons I can give
out so much is because God has given
me so much.
I hear other speakers talk about getting dry.
I've never known that experience since my conversion,
getting dry.
I'm willing to have that experience.
But to me, you've got this book and
you've got these books and you've got also
ministry on cassette, which people hundreds of years
ago did not have.
How in the world can you get dry?
You won't always be the same.
And I think of this little library here.
I know, of course, great books are missing,
but I wonder how many of you just
take advantage of the spiritual food in that
library.
I think behind that door over there are
cassettes.
Somebody wrote from the ship recently, oh, some
of the cassettes are getting old here.
You know, to me, the older the better.
If they got any here by D.L.
Moody, I'd sure like to listen to them.
It's not the age of the cassette.
There may be a few things that are
not relevant, but boy, if you can get
any tapes by George Whitfield or Wesley, you
listen to them.
Some of the people who made those cassettes
on the ship are now with the Lord.
I certainly hope they don't start throwing them
away.
Another tremendous thing you can do with cassettes
is make cassette and send home to your
churches.
One of the messages I shared here at
the Leaders Conference, and I hope you'll somehow
get a hold of those tapes.
You may want to write down a few
of these tape titles because sometimes you have
to battle to get a hold of them.
But I shared a message on how to
spread the vision.
One of our goals in India, perhaps a
little more than Nepal, is to spread the
vision to the Indian churches.
We've been really trying to deal with this.
And one of the ways that we can
do that, of course, is making use of
cassette tapes.
Last year here in Kathmandu we made a
tape with various reports of different OM leaders.
A couple of hundred copies of that tape
went all over the world.
And people use those tapes in their prayer
meetings.
A lot of prayer groups connected with OM
are looking for new material.
A tape with reports from the field, even
the sound effects in the background, birds or
gongs from the temples or whatever, can all
add to the challenge of a cassette tape.
It's also a good way to communicate even
to individuals.
My wife and I here in Kathmandu made
a tape for our children.
They actually sent us one first before we
even sent one back to them.
So we can use tapes in evangelism.
We can use tapes to communicate the vision.
We can use tapes to increase our own
knowledge of the word.
A lot of us have to do some
routine things.
We have to clean.
I like to clean.
I have as nearly as much time to
do it as I would like to.
Especially now with the Walkman, but even an
ordinary tape recorder, for years they've had those
little earplugs you put in your ear.
That's a new invention.
You can sometimes listen to messages without disturbing
others, and you can listen to messages when
you're doing routine tasks.
The last two years I've been doing a
lot of my jogging, listening to Bible reading
messages.
It's tremendous to be jogging along with Dr.
Lloyd-Jones, or Stephen Alpert, or Alan Redpath.
It does bother me that some people, because
it's new, because they're not used to it,
they reject this.
I had one leader very proudly tell me,
major leader in Owen, I never listen to
tapes.
What would he like if I looked at
him and said, I never read books.
I mean, ridiculous.
And if we can read books, we can
listen to tapes.
Because, it's interesting, that same person actually went
through seven years of university studies.
You have to listen to all kinds of
lectures.
This way you don't have to sit in
the classroom, you can take the lecture and
even listen to it propped up in bed
when you're ill.
I remember when I was seasick coming across
the Indian Ocean to India, listening to a
great series by Dr. Francis Shainer.
People say, oh, I wish I could go
to Labrie.
You know what you do if you go
to Labrie?
You just sit and listen to tapes.
Well, I never bothered to go, I just
got the tapes.
Listened to them, and I've been greatly helped
in my faith through various tapes of Dr.
Francis Shainer.
Once someone has this vision and has this
burden, then they can build up their tape
library.
If no one has the burden of the
vision, of course the tape library just becomes
something sitting in a box in the local
base somewhere.
The ships, of course, have fantastic tape libraries.
Sometimes they even go extreme.
One Indian brother listened to 230-some Goa
messages, which is way too much of one
particular speaker.
Eventually we had to encourage him to leave
LM actually.
There's no miracle cure.
If you find someone actually eating the tape,
you know that they've gotten too far and
they're trying some kind of a shortcut.
But I thought in terms of cassette tapes,
that rather than just give you one little
message, a little time I have with you
as an apology, I would give you a
curriculum of tapes that I'd like you to
try to listen to.
If you want to get a little better
idea, or more of an idea, of some
of the things that I'm teaching.
For example, I go on Lagos, spend a
whole week there teaching.
I go on Thule, spend a whole week
teaching.
With the leaders, ten days.
With those down at the border, of course
that was a different message every day, that
I had eleven days of teaching.
With you I have one devotional session.
So I thought I'd sacrifice my devotional session
to give you a curriculum for advanced study
in OM of people in out-of-the
-way places.
If you ever feel a little neglected here
in Nepal, there's been now a petition that's
gone down to India, send us your Bible
speakers, which is good, of course.
You can have a Bible study in a
group listening to the best preachers in the
world on cassette tape.
Now, it's a disadvantage you can't ask questions
after.
That is a distinct advantage of having people.
But one thing I've learned is you can
write these Christian leaders and you often get
more thought-through answers sometimes.
People like William MacDonald, you can write him.
He'd be thrilled to get a letter from
Nepal.
He's got a burden here.
He's been praying for OM 27 years.
And he would be happy to answer your
questions if you listened to some of his
cassettes.
Now, I keep a lot of my outlines
in my Bible, so I just thought I'd
share a few messages.
I'll say a few things about these messages
and the Lord may speak to us through
that.
And try to whet your appetite, and then
you'll have the task of trying to get
a hold of these tapes.
Some of them are down in Ruby Gomez,
the original, in Gorakhpur.
Let me just give you some of the
ones that have been on my heart lately
and then a few others that I have
in my Bible.
I shared a message I'd like you to
hear on how to keep OM young.
Never preached on this before.
Why did it take me 25 years, 8
years to get this message?
Thought of these things and mentioned some of
these thoughts.
Never had a message on this until a
few days ago.
That's five main points.
We've got to remain learners.
We've got to keep changing and avoid especially
OM pride.
We've got to understand and use modern technology
in the media.
We've got to specialize in hot communication.
And we can't sacrifice our basic policies.
That's the skeleton on what I feel is
a very, very strong message that really knocks
out some of these ideas that as we
get older we're not going to be able
to relate to the young people.
And of course a lot of your mission
agencies have grown older and they are not
relating to the young people.
And they are looking to OM to supply
them with trained young people.
There's a lot of thoughts on that subject
that I would love to share with you.
Another message I shared recently I'd like you
to listen to is the seven major obstacles
of the work of OM India.
Again, they outline the state of the church
and God's people in India.
Two, the sins of the tongue.
Three, the lack of vision, discipline and initiative.
Four, the financial situation of India.
Five, the spread of extremism, denominationalism and the
lack of wisdom.
Six, the family pressure problem.
Very important to understand that when you're in
Nepal as well.
And then seven, the lack of deep trust
and faith.
I was so encouraged by that message because
the Lord gave me a message.
I've never given that message before as well.
Maybe similar things years ago.
And I've asked everybody in Gorakhpur to listen
to that tape.
They only take, I think, everybody there.
Listen to it.
Then you, of course, as an OMer, already
know this and are using this little leaflet.
I'm sure you already have it translated into
Nepali.
The seven major emphasis of Operation Mobilization.
In addition, you don't even need to put
the word OM.
You can call it seven biblical emphasis.
You don't have to mention OM.
And down on the border I shared further
thoughts on the seven major emphasis for people
that have been studying that and are aware
of that.
And then I already mentioned to you the
message of seven major blunders of the returning
OMer.
Another message I've been sharing that you might
want to get a hold of.
I have nowhere.
I guess copies are around somewhere.
So seven reasons why you should go.
If you have any friend and you want
to give them something strong to get them
to go to mission field, you just send
them that tape.
I first gave that on the Dulas.
Imagine on the Dulas, 70 people stood to
commit themselves to career missions as a result
of that message.
I've been giving it a lot more since.
But I only give that message to people
who have already had some experience.
I don't give it to new recruits.
People who have already had some conferences or
some OM experience because some of the reasons
for them going are based on their previous
experience.
If you can make use of that tape,
I think you would find it quite encouraging.
Then there's a little tape floating around called
the challenge of missions.
This has only got five points.
Five points.
Any of these messages, you can listen to
them and make up your own message so
that when you go back to your church,
you've got some things to share.
This is the message I've shared in some
of the churches.
It's the challenge of the unreached people, the
challenge of undisciplined youth, the challenge of sleepy
adults, the challenge of frozen assets, and the
challenge of misplaced priorities.
Isn't that dynamite for an outline?
I must admit, even though I've done that
myself.
I get challenged by these outlines.
What else should I share with you?
Whenever I share the seven major emphases, I
remind people that these seven major emphases are
built on the major doctrinal emphasis of OM.
OM has a doctrinal statement.
Those emphases in that little leaflet, if they're
not built on sound doctrine, they could lead
you even into a cult.
I have ten major doctrines of OM message.
I don't have much chance to share because
so many other people are preaching on doctrine.
The personal triune God of love, creation.
The Bible is God's word, number two.
Jesus Christ is atoning death, number three.
Number four, the lostness of men.
Number five, justification by faith.
Six, the Holy Spirit is in the dwelling.
Seven, the church, both universal and local.
Eight, the second coming of Christ.
Nine, the doctrine of heaven and hell.
Of course, there are other major doctrines.
Very seldom share this.
Shared it once in a church in Jordan.
I didn't know where.
I was like Daniel in the lions then.
This church was drifting away from teaching on
the trinity.
My first point was the personal triune God.
It had a revolution.
The influence out of Iraq because of the
sensitivity of this among Muslims was teaching a
sort of Jesus only or one God, no
trinity type of theory.
There's a lack of just basic Bible doctrine
teaching.
Of course, to be able to teach doctrine
in a way that it's interesting and exciting
is, I think, especially helpful.
Then there's a message floating around you may
want to get a hold of someday.
By the way, if anybody has the interest
to write me for any of these tapes,
you'll be sure you'll get them.
There's not that many people ever write asking
for tapes.
They all think I'm too busy, but I
just give it to my secretary.
She's too busy, so she gives it to
Mark.
He's too busy, so sometimes the tapes don't
go.
But anyway, we try hard.
This is a message you may want to
get a hold of one of these days
floating around the ON tape jungle.
Keeping our motivation high.
If my motivation is high, nothing can touch
me.
I can walk by the best-looking chick.
Some girl just jogged past me down the
trail here.
My motivation is high today.
I didn't give it a second thought.
But if my motivation is low, then somehow
I can get in other troubles, at least
in the mind.
So my goal is to keep the motivation
high.
I don't like any of this low motivation.
I like to get highly motivated.
So this is a message for myself.
Eleven points.
Don't write these down.
Just to whet your appetite.
Discipline in the word.
Eyes on the Lord at the foot of
the cross.
Looking to the fields.
All things work together for good.
The life of Jesus, the life of Paul,
and all the other saints.
Time is short.
We have the truth.
Little things count.
Books, films.
Number eleven.
Seeing other people fall.
What will ever happen to me if I
get away from Jesus?
Well, there are many other points on that
motivation message.
I gave a message here in Nepali, which
I think you ought to listen to, English
Nepali, on how disunity comes.
Some of you were there.
People came to me immediately and said, look,
this message is needed all over Nepal.
Copies are already down in Butwal.
And I think the Lord may bring healing.
And that situation, which took place a year
and a half ago, is still not healed.
I don't think that one church is ever
going to all come back and sit in
the same church.
But I think there could be some degree
of dialogue and healing.
I spoke in both churches when I was
there.
The number of people caught up in that
struggle don't go to any church now.
But enemies of...
This isn't the same message, but this is
an outline.
Enemies of fellowship and community.
And believe me, you may be having good
fellowship here.
I sense there's a good team spirit here,
but the devil will attack.
He'll just wait.
Maybe he'll wait to change of seasons.
We've got a lot of people coming through
here these days.
Maybe a lull somewhere in the enemy will
attack through that.
But here are the enemies of fellowship.
There's only ten of them.
Pride, idealism, sins of the tongue, crooked thinking
and the lack of wisdom, impatience, lack of
true love, darkness, lack of vision, unfaithfulness, and
failure to receive admonition and correction.
How are you on that last point?
Are you good at receiving admonition?
Wayne goes over to where you're staying, or
up to your room.
I just was up in that top room
on the roof.
It's not as messy as the last time
I was here, so it's actually quite encouraging.
But, you know, how do you handle when
someone tries to give you an admonition?
You know, sometimes we receive admonition quite easily
if it's a main leader, you know.
It's a main leader, we sort of respect
him.
But what about when it comes from an
equal?
Why not it comes from someone who you
feel, you would never say that, but you
feel, you know, they're not quite senior to
you.
And they try to correct you.
That's an interesting experience.
And then I have an old tape floating
around, dealing with emotional problems.
Really being honest.
These are eight ways to deal with emotional
problems.
Really being honest with ourselves and others.
Two, appropriating God's love and forgiveness.
I hope you're pushing healing for damaged emotions.
Three, handling the fear of failure and rejection.
Four, taking care of the body, relaxation, knowing
your limits.
Watch out for those big energy thieves.
Have you ever heard of the five big
energy thieves?
Some of you are tired.
Here's the five big energy thieves.
Worry, fear, bitterness, perfectionism, and guilt.
They can actually, I'm convinced, drain you of
energy.
Now, you may be tired for other reasons.
Failed to sleep last night.
But there's five energy thieves.
Being negative is another major energy thief.
I've got to give my message, seven major
energy thieves, but I haven't done that yet.
Five, getting involved.
Getting involved with others.
You know, as I was so involved with
these Indian brethren the last 11 days, I
hardly had time to think about my own
problems.
And I got them.
Struggles, doubts, you name it.
I mean, these brothers, much more difficult situations
than most of us.
Their future, even finding a job.
Who they're going to marry.
They have many of no choice of who
they're going to marry.
The dowry thing.
I'm sure it's quite overwhelming sometimes when you
get too involved.
But a certain amount of involvement is incredibly
healthy for our own emotional life.
Getting involved.
Six, positive attitude.
I have scripture references, of course, for all
these things.
Seven, most people go through life with problems.
Don't overreact to yours.
Eight, freedom via discipline and balance.
Then I have my great mysteries message.
I don't think I've ever preached this one.
The five great mysteries.
To me, unless you understand the mystery theory,
you run into difficulties eventually in life because
you're always trying to find out the answer.
All these problems and all these hurts and
why does God allow suffering?
To me, the mystery message has really saved
me.
I have five mysteries.
There are many more than the mystery of
life itself.
Six mysteries.
The mystery of life itself to the mystery
of sex.
That just blows my mind.
I'd love to give you my sex mystery
message, but I haven't preached it yet.
And the mystery of death.
Here we're having lunch.
This guy walks in.
Son was gone.
You're never going to see him again.
Down there burning in the river.
Dead.
Mystery of death.
The mystery of heaven.
Mystery of hell.
The mystery of the atonement.
Actually, it worked into a gospel message.
And I don't know if you've heard my
balance in the home message.
Have you heard my balance in the home
message?
Nine ways to have balance in the home.
Here's nine areas where you have to wrestle
for balance.
You'll be going out of your minds to
get all these tapes.
Having respect and having humility as a parent.
Having respect and how to have humility.
I goofed on that.
I think I come out without either one
at times.
Number two, discipline, love, and freedom.
Forsake all.
Maintain a home, a neat, tidy home, and
a testimony, a tough one.
Four, living by faith, taking proper care of
the family.
Five, getting things organized versus learning patience and
long suffering.
Six, sharing versus being kind in all things.
Seven, having convictions versus letting love cover.
Eight, having a healthy diet versus not wasting
or living extravagantly.
Number nine, work and evangelism versus play and
recreation.
That's very much linked with a balanced view
of God.
Holiness versus mercy.
Wrath versus forgiveness.
Truth versus love.
Righteousness versus grace.
You know, my problem, I feel that I'm
a truth glutton.
Yeah, truth glutton, that's a good term.
I feel I have so much truth.
I've read so many books.
I have so many messages.
I can't even share, even once a year,
just the truths that are on my heart
that I'm able to share.
There's many truths I have that I'm not
very good at sharing.
And I think this is often a problem.
I was listening to one of these revival
tapes and when the great revival broke out
in the 1800s in New York City, the
believers there gathered in these prayer meetings that
led to this massive revival.
They said, we've had enough teaching, but nothing's
happening in our lives.
And so they stopped the teaching sessions.
It was unusual.
They started having prayer meetings and then the
revival came and spread to Philadelphia.
Hundreds of thousands were brought into the kingdom.
What an amazing story.
I'm sure some of you have read about
that.
Seven areas of false motivation in God's work.
The praise of men.
Pride and ego trips.
Three, vested interests.
Four, money and selfishness.
Five, fear to move out.
Six, bitterness, revenge, and resentment.
Seven, trying to prove oneself linked with insecurity.
Foundation for knowing God's will.
The Harbor Lights first preached this in Germany
in a former Hitler camp up in the
mountains, taken over by a group of deaconesses.
They asked me to speak on the will
of God, not my favorite subject.
So I got this.
Ten, twelve ways to find the will of
God.
Number one, emphasize spiritual life.
Two, submission to God.
Three, thanksgiving.
Four, trust.
Five, witness.
Six, learning God's viewpoint.
Getting things in basic focus.
And then remember, God guides different people in
different ways.
Two, waiting on Him.
It's in two different sections.
Three, the word.
Four, prayer.
Five, providence.
Six, moving by faith, not being passive.
Seven, willing to take a risk.
Many people never find God's will.
They're not willing to take a risk.
I'd love to give you my risk message,
but I haven't developed it yet.
Well, have you had enough outlines?
Miracles we need?
I gave this message at Bethany Fellowship.
A man heard the tape from one of
America's leading publishers and asked me to write
a book on it, which I refused to
do.
It's called The Seven Major Miracles.
The miracle of stability.
It starts off talking about the miracles of
New Testament healing, the raising of the dead.
People are really getting excited.
Wow, another miracle message.
Then I go, the seven major miracles needed
in America, especially, I usually change it depending
on what country I'm in.
The miracle of stability.
The miracle of spiritual balance.
The miracle of moral purity.
Many who have been healed, miraculously later on,
fall into moral impurity.
So that's a greater miracle, isn't it?
The miracle of ongoing reality.
The miracle of a happy holy marriage.
The miracle of listening and learning.
The miracle of perseverance.
In the last couple of September conferences, I've
given the seven major messes problem, message.
Any of you heard that?
The seven major messes, N-O-N.
Messes.
You don't make a mess, you spill everything
on the kitchen floor.
Got to get all these into German.
Here are the seven major messes, N-O
-N.
Financial messes, social policy messes, literature message, organizational
messes, transportation messages, messes, relationship messes, and doctrinal
messes.
I like to mix the outlines, by the
way.
What time is it?
We're going to finish right on time.
Okay, 15 minutes.
You won't hear from me for another year,
unless you get into these tapes.
I love to mix red hot quotes, you
know.
If you're not a brilliant mind throwing out
new quotes every day, well, simple, that's not
a great problem.
Get other people's quotes, like me.
Here's Dietrich Bonhoeffer, listening to this in German.
The angry word is a blow struck at
a brother, a stab at his heart.
It seeks to hit, to hurt, to destroy.
A deliberate insult is worse, for we openly
disgrace our brother in the eyes of the
world, causing others to despise it.
Just this morning, I wrote next to that,
Proverbs 18, 9, 19 and Proverbs 18, 8.
Brother offended is harder to win than a
strong city.
To me, that kind of quote is just
so powerful.
Here's a message I've probably only given once.
Especially dedicated to Wayne, because he's the administrator,
now the acting leader of the Nepal field,
a full-fledged field within Operation Mobilization.
Not to be treated like some second-rate,
distant place of nondescripts.
Here's the balance in administration.
Here it is.
Seven areas of balance in administration.
Authority, liberty, methodology, expediency, thriftiness, accomplishment,
quality, quantity, consolidation, expansion, being a servant, delegating,
details, overview.
You get it?
Good.
Praise the Lord, this work is going to
go uphill.
The marks of the living local church.
I remember giving this one in Poland.
All over Poland these tapes go in Polish
language.
It's amazing the feedback I get from that.
The marks of a living church.
And this is true of a living team,
which I hope you'll be.
Learn together by growing together.
Learning to love, learning from God's Word.
Learning to pray, learning to witness, learning to
repent.
Growing, multiplying church.
Seven things.
Simple things.
You know, people say, last year when I
arrived back on my team, it was in
the worst state of any year that I'd
ever gone to Asia.
I mean, it was in disarray.
A lot of reasons, a lot of reasons.
Not blaming anybody.
But one of the things the enemy tries
to use is during the year we feel
well.
It's not training a program enough.
How am I getting trained?
We're looking for something at times in life
that doesn't even exist.
You know, there's not a little stereotype package
I can give you for one year.
At the end of the year you're going
to come out trained.
We could get five people to argue what
the word training even means.
Are you talking about intellectual training, academic training?
Are you talking about God's great training program?
It seems to me everybody's in that, whether
they come on or not.
They may be running away from it.
But you know, the things we need to
be trained in, that is worked into our
life, are these basics.
Like this, growing together, learning to love.
If you learn more how to love in
OM, then you have fulfilled a major training
goal.
If you haven't learned how to love, no
increase of study program, no increase of academic
things is going to necessarily resolve that.
It may help, but without obedience it won't
help.
And studying the word, and especially learning how
to study the word yourself, I'm sure probably
your study program here in Nepal is not
a whirlwind program.
When you read sometimes about other fields, it
may always sound better.
When you get there, and I visit all
the fields, it's not always all.
It's cracked up to be.
Because in fact, without personal discipline, the best
of our study programs actually often go down
the tube.
And if you are serious about study and
training, and really at least knowing what's on
the heart of OM, then I do commend
you to some of these messages that God
has put on my heart.
Let's just go to the back of my
Bible and see what we've got.
Back here.
The 13 dangers that face OM.
This is one I preach three times a
year, mainly to leaders.
But I first gave this to the first
coordinators conference in Diehl in the early 1960s.
1960s, these were 13 things I felt were
dangers for OM at that time.
If they were dangers then, how much now?
One, getting set in our ways.
Two, not walking in the light.
Three, not taking time to meet for prayer.
Four, not being involved in evangelism, a very
basic one.
Five, subtle influences of a lukewarm.
Six, presumption that we now know the principles.
Seven, choosing the road of least resistance, especially
in regard to our temperaments.
Eight, listening too quickly to evil reports.
Nine, allowing discipline to slip.
Ten, subtle forms of pride.
Eleven, slacking off in our battle against lust.
Twelve, neglecting the home.
Thirteen, idealism.
Even before Dr. Seaman's book came out, we
declared idealism as a deadly enemy of OM
or of reality.
The big mistakes the leaders make.
This has gone to leaders and pastors conferences
all over the world.
Very, very basic.
Neglect of the word, prayer, and personal worship.
One.
Two, neglect of the body, especially discipline and
exercise.
Three, the neglect of reading and learning from
others.
Four, neglect of the wife, family, and sex
life.
Five, neglect...
That's for married people.
Five, neglect of personal outreach and evangelism.
And visitation, personal contact.
Six, discipline.
Lack of discipline in food, sex, and sleep.
Seven, failure to handle criticism.
That's the biggest.
Eight, tangents, extremes, false doctrine.
Nine, failure to press on to the end.
Ten, failure to cultivate real love.
Down at the border, I also shared my
eighteen secrets of survival, which are not secret.
I shared those with the girls.
Part one and part two.
That tape is easily available.
To me, the Christian life is, at times,
survival.
If I had gone through what Wayne and
Sheila went through recently, to me it would
be just survival.
I wouldn't be thinking about how many souls
I'm going to win tomorrow, how many things
I'm going to...
Just survival.
Just somehow to make it through the emotion
and all that's involved in that.
And a lot of times we have to
pull into a survival position.
We're not going to accomplish a lot at
that time.
We may be having ongoing bouts with depression
or confusion or questions.
But if you have a basic strategy for
survival, a biblical strategy, you'll get through.
You'll get through.
And it includes weeping.
It includes a lot of different things that
sometimes are looked on as unspiritual.
As you know, I'm a bit extreme in
the area of balance, according to my daughter.
I have here twenty-one ways to maintain
balance in foreign missions.
You know, people in O.M. are often
very ignorant of missions.
You don't have to all rush to California
and take a course on missiology.
But it is good to read some basic
books about missions, a few of the basics,
and certainly everybody here should read the history
of Nepal.
I've only been here a short time and
I've been reading the history of Nepal.
I never realized that the British and the
Nepalis had a war back here in 1815,
a very important bit of history.
And Nepal lost some of their land.
And later on, it was a favor for
the Gurkhas, helping them to get a little
of that land back, very interesting.
You ought to read the history of Nepal.
But you ought to understand something about missions.
And there's a lot of controversy in missionary
work.
We have to be able to lovingly defend
why O.M. still gives out tracts, why
O.M. is not planting churches in Bihar,
as a main strategy.
Some of the missionaries in the United Mission,
because modern missions, a lot of the modern
missionary speaking today, the real top men, are
a bit anti the kind of thing that
the United Mission and Nepal are doing.
They're very sensitive about that.
One brother at the table at Butwal immediately
started.
I said, look, you don't have to worry
about me.
I believe in all the different methods of
missionary work.
I preach how God uses the kind of
work you're involved in here.
Oh, wow.
I thought an enemy became a friend.
No, I don't think he was an enemy.
But it is unfortunate that different missionary strategists
get at one another's throats.
There's a lot of hyper-idealism now, a
lot of things coming into missionary thinking.
We can have strong convictions.
We can be led our own particular way
and strategy, but not condemn others.
That's why I have these 21 points.
Keeping the balance.
Teens versus the local church, closed lands versus
open lands, lostness of man versus the love
of Christ, in terms of motivation.
Your talent versus go everywhere, short-term versus
long-term, radical versus the status quo, education
versus action.
Then I got on the same page 22
ways to keep the balance in your spiritual
life.
I think you've all heard that message.
And 10 foundations for communication, 7 ways that
you're going to be tested.
You know that?
You're going to be tested.
Tests of maturity.
I preach that one all over the world.
Always change the message.
Just keep the outline.
Misunderstandings, criticisms, deep infatuation.
You ever had that?
That's heavy.
I hope you don't have one of those,
Wayne.
I had it a few years after I
was married.
I saw this Swedish girl, blew every circuit
in my head.
Did I tell you about that, honey?
Sure I did.
It's years ago.
You've forgotten.
Anyway, it left as fast as it came.
But that is a big test of maturity,
whether you can deal with a deep infatuation.
David didn't deal with it and ended up
in a big mess.
4, extra money.
Suddenly you inherited 100,000 pounds.
Big test.
5, success.
Often the backdoor to failure.
6, failure.
Disappointment should be the backdoor to success, but
often to despair.
7, suffering.
7 tests of spiritual maturity.
9, tangents.
Have you heard that one?
9 tangents.
Mr. Ego Trip, Mr. Emotionalism, Signs, Wonders, and
Miracles, The Only Church Crowd, Legalism, Liberty Cult,
Extreme Calvinistic Band, Perfectionism, Liberalism, and the Prosperity
Cult.
That's 10.
Well, I think that's enough.
Let's pray.
That's my curriculum.
I give it to you.
The tapes are around and many more.
And I hope that you'll sign up.
Advanced stage cassette tape.
Match anything you can get in some Bible
schools.
Let's pray.
Father, we thank you that you've given us
so much truth from so many men.
Lord, we have so much of this material
on tape, even in Hindi and Malayalam and
now in Nepali, other languages, so many Urdu
tapes going all over Pakistan.
Lord, we believe some of us can also
be making our own tapes, sending them out,
which we share what you're doing in our
own lives.
Father, we believe there's going to be a
Bible teaching revolution of hot communication to bring
people to real repentance, to get people more
on a balanced biblical path of reality.
Lord, we rebuke Satan and his attempts to
discourage us, get us sidetracked, get us into
anything that's less than the best.
And we thank you now for the privilege
of being here together.
Lord, even though this is just a short
time, we believe that it's going to be
a catalyst for a lot of other things
we're going to study in these books up
here on the shelves.
Many of these books express these truths far
better than any of my tapes.
That's where even I've got some of this
material, not always even aware of it.
You have so many ways of teaching us.
We learn from others.
We learn from experience.
Every conversation we have.
Lord, give us real Nepali friends that we
may learn from.
And may we make an impact upon this
nation, we pray.
In Jesus' precious name, amen.